What is your ROCK?

Taking a walk with my children the other day we came across a pile of rocks, they had so much fun digging through them looking at all their different shapes, sizes, colors, and characteristics. This particular pile had a lot of cracked rocks and I remember thinking that was odd. Today while cleaning, I was spending some time to try and just be quiet and see what I could hear from God and you knw what he told me....Rocks can crack. If we put our hope/identity/value in our rocks we will be disappointed because rocks crack. Our friends, family, pastors, mentors, children, and even our spouses will fail us at times. They will "crack" under pressure, hurt, fear, insecurity, stress, anxiety, or life. Our hope/identity/value should be in the one and only SOLID ROCK, Jesus Christ, he is a rock that will not crack. He will NEVER leave you, he will NEVER fail you, he will ALWAYS be there for you, these are his promises to us!!!! I am so grateful that You, Jesus are my rock!!!! So what is your rock?

The time has come for the TALK with my daughter

I sit here this afternoon trying to plan out the "talk" with my daughter who will be 10 in two weeks. I have decided to break it up into 2 different talks mostly because we have viewed the sex ed for 4th graders at her school and find it acceptable for her to participate so I need to tell her before she hears it at school next week and because I think she may still be too young for the birds and the bees talk so we are just going to do the talk about becoming a women and a womens anatomy which is what the cirriculum covers at school as well. It blows my mind that we are already at this stage of life, but 25 percent of girls start their periods between ages 9-11 that is CRAZY to me. I can't even imagine my daughter having a period, man I am not ready for this. So this memorial day weekend will have a new memory in our house :) The woman talk. I am going to try and make it special but not embarrasing special just informative special. The birds and the bees talk will come later this summer. Anyway prayers are appreciated as we enter this new phase of life with children.

Baby Names

This week Kelly's Korner is hosting a blog about Baby Names. What a super cute and fun idea so I thought it would be fun to share, this is my first time doing a link to a blog so if I did it wrong please forgive me:)

Our first born a girl is named

Raychael Annelise

Raychael, pronounced Rachel, is a name my husband chose and I will have to say I didn't really like it at first, but it has totally grown on me over the years. She will be 10 in June. I added the Y to her name because I like Y's in girl names.

our second child a girl also is

Allyah Rae

Allyah, pronounced A-lie-ah and that is lie as in a lie not lee :), is a name my husband has liked forever. I really liked it too and we talked about it for our firstborn, but he thought it was too different haha. Rae is just something that sounded good with it and has no significance.

our third child is a boy and is name is

Levi Marcus

We really liked the name Elijah but thought Allyah and Elijah would be too hard in the same family so we chose Levi instead which we both really liked as well and let me tell you, our little man is definitly a Levi :). Marcus is after my father-in-law and I love our little mans name.

We had a much easier time picking out boy names than girl names and I am not sure why here are a few other boy names we like

Josiah David
Malachi Joseph

Here are a few other girl names we like too.

Kennedy Isabelle
Josselyn Grace

Full Sentence Man

I have just been in awe listening to my son these last few days. He says a ton for an almost two year old little boy but the last week it is like BIG sentences have arrived. Yesterday he came up to me while I was washing dishes with his cereal bowl in hands. Mama, wash bowl, here go. So cute! Then he brought me his pacifier and said "mama, wash pac, woof woof bite, that icky" meaning he needed me to wash his paci because the dogs bit it. Wow. I remember being so worried that the girls would speak for my son or that he wouldn't talk as much because he was a boy, but I really had nothing to worry about. I did talk to my girls about letting him express himslef and letting him talk and I do try to work hard to make sure he sees my mouth when I talk so he can learn. I probably work a little harder at it with him since I was so worried, but that is okay, I am happy that he talks so much it is so fun to hear his little voice. I can't believe he is almost two. He has come such a long way and I am truly trying to treasure each moment with him since he is my last. I love you my full sentence man.

Spiritual Do Over

Do you ever just get stuck in the rut of life? Doing the same things over and over good and bad things? I am there now and I need a spiritual do over. My devotions have been lacking, I have been negative, I have allowed my mind and heart to become dry, I am impatient, selfish, and just plain tired and I am done. I want my heart to sing again, to be albe to love myself and others the way Jesus would. I have allowed myself to get stuck in a rut and it is time to get out. Time to remember the things that are truly important and forget the things that take up to much time in my mind and heart that truly don't matter. I want to pray with fervor again, to feel that wonderful feeling in my heart when I pray and worship (I do those things even in my rut, but they become just something to do not something I feel). I want to feel that passion again in my life. So, how do I change that???? I started yesterday by picking up the Bible:) I read through a bunch of Proverbs and it was sooo good and refreshing. Today I picked it up and I decided to go to my favorite book of the Bible, Colossians and read my favorite scripture from Highschool. Colossians 3:1-17. Such a good reminder of where my focus should be. My worship music is on, my heart has been renewed by scripture, and now I am going to go about my day and try to meditate on Colossians 3:1-17. I also decided it is time to start memorizing scripture again, something we are called to do, but I am WAY out of practice and that is okay nothing to beat myself up over, just time to start over. So here is to my spritual do over. I am so ready!!!!!

Emotional

I really hate being emotional. I don't cry often but when I do it feels good and I have decided that crying doesn't mean emotional. I am learning that I am really just an emotional person. I feel with all my heart and mind, part of that is being a girl and the other part well I don't know, but I don't really like it. I don't like the raw feeling of emotion or the loneliness that it sometimes brings. I am a feircely loyal person and I thank Jesus for making me that way but it doesn't come without pain. I have had to learn that just because I am super loyal doesn't mean that everyone else is going to have that same loyalty to me, most of the time it doesn't phase me, but there are certain times of the month where it really bugs me. Couple that with crying and you just have me an emotional mess that nobody knows how to deal with because it isn't who I really am. I just want someone to love me unconditionally through my emotion without judging me or trying to fix the problem, just be with me. Oh wait...there is someone who does that for me, Jesus. Thank you Jesus for loving who you made even when I am ugly.

It Really is the Little Things

So every Christmas we set out our Little People Nativity set and every year I meticulously put it away with all of the rest of the Christmas decorations... last year I must have not been so meticulous which is not like me, but is something I am trying to learn so I guess that is a good thing. I set it all up this year and was so proud, until I went to my friends house who has the same nativity and noticed that I was missing two pieces (a cow and some food). I went home really bummed about it, but proud of myself at the same time for letting go of some of my neurotic behavior (every play set MUST stay together). I was REALLY bummed about it for like a week and decided maybe I should check all of the other little people play sets to see if they got mixed. I went to my sons room and was delighted to find the food, I promptly returned the food to the nativity set which was getting ready to be put away until next year. Still really bummed I prayed that Jesus would take away the bummers and allow me to move on... after all it is just a toy.

Later that day I was frantically searching the house for all of my sons pacifiers which I boil like once a month to sterilize them (see the neurotic side of me) I was missing just one, but kept searching and searching. I decided to look under the couch, we have this weird hole (which I like to call the Bermuda triangle) in our couch that allows things to fall under the cushions and into the springs but still impossible to get to because it sits protected by that layer of fabric that almost touches the floor. Well a few weeks ago I found a hole in that fabric and found keys that had been missing forever, some pacifiers, a few little people animals and other random things. I was sure the missing pacifier had to be there. I reached my hand into the hole and to my surprise pulled out the NATIVITY COW. Can you imagine my joy and surprise. I started giggling and said a little thank you prayer to Jesus for loving me enough to care about the little things. My girls thought I was hysterical after prancing around the house saying "Jesus gave us the nativity cow". My nativity is now whole and safely put away for next year and every time I have been bummed about something this week I start giggling and tell Jesus thanks for the nativity cow.

About the pacifier... I found it chewed up under the dog bed... oh well you win some and lose some.